Warstories: Feeding the tip jar

While perusing through the AD&D 1e Dungeon Master’s Guide’s introduction, I read a few interesting things. One was the amount of hyping that Gygax did to “official” AD&D products, and how you should not pay attention to 3rd party stuff. I found this comical because of the amount of grief people give WOTC about being a money grubbing company and what not.

The other thing that stood out was his suggestion that DM’s collect money from the players in order to purchase miniatures. Yes Virginia, 1e AD&D encouraged miniatures use (and told you to charge your players for them).

But really the point of this article is to find out how DM’s out there handle this in their home games. I know that the way I DM can be a little expensive. I like to print out color maps when possible, make tokens, buy minis, keep an active DDI subscription and make purchases on books that I know my players aren’t buying.

Historically in the games that I’ve been involved with, the DM has never charged players for the gaming supplies or anything other than the food we all split. I’ve never charged players at my game either, and I go through ink cartridges like they’re going out of style.

So I ask DM’s out there, how do you handle the expenses of the game at the table? Do you suck it up and take them, or do you expect your players to help cover the costs? Also, do you find a resistance from players to help cover costs, or are they willing to part with their cash for the benefit of the group?

I too like color maps and will pull maps off the web or from WotC and break them up in photoshop and print them in pieces, in color.

I used to try to use minis but they just started getting ridiculously expensive if you really wanted to have the correct mini for the actual enemy. Now I make my own tokens with a 1 inch punch and washers (still use Minis for the PCs though). It works well and I can quickly make the correct tokens for the battle in a few minutes. I also have bought the Fiery Dragon counter sets, which are very affordable and work really well. I also buy older 3rd edition “fantastic locations” modules off ebay because they usually have at least one large glossy double sited battle map included, sometimes two. They are generally of very high quality and are done so they can be used in lots of different scenarios. I also own a chessex battle mat and markers and almost every 4E hardcover book. I’ve never asked for money from my players but would LOVE to get them to kick in once in a while. But honestly, I don’t even mind the money so much as just the amount of time I put in to make the tokens, make the maps, etc. I also have lots of fun little handouts. But fortunately, I actually enjoy much of what I do to make the game night more fun and run more smoothly. The payoff for me are the smiles on the players faces and the fact that we have so many people wanting to come to my game night that we’ve nearly had to start turning them away or split into two groups.

If anyone has a good way to solicit some money from the table without coming off like a jerk I’d be glad to hear it. Can’t wait to see what everyone says.

By and large, I take all the burden of the expenses for the actual gaming. I’m the only one with a current DDI subscription, I have nearly all the 4e books, I do the printouts of character sheets and other material, and so on. Thankfully, I don’t absolutely need minis because I have a decent collection and one of my players has one that’s absolutely ridiculous. Same with dungeon tiles. I have a fair few and my player has tons. So at least I’m spared that. Also, I rarely have to chip in for things like food or drinks for the gaming sessions, so it’s not all bad.

We split food sometimes and that’s about it. The rest comes out of pocket for me, even the minis for their characters. If I’m traveling to someone else’s place to DM and bringing along my stuff (as opposed to them coming to mine) I’ll usually bring a case of beer or food, or both and pass it around. In turn my players sometimes feel bad that I’m “doing everything” so they buy the food/drinks once in a while and refuse to let me pay. They also go out and buy their own PHB’s etc. It works and I’m fine being a “provider” for the group, it’s just kinda my nature.

For going on 14 years now our games have been potluck. I don’t mind buying the books and such (THEY’RE MINE!! ALL MINE!) but the food gets spendy.

The rule is a dish or 5 bucks – player’s choice. There is often charity involved, but there aint nothing more pathitic looking than a broke, starved gamer watching the rest of the group eat in front of him 🙂

We used to be a group of ten. Game was like a buffet back then. Nowadays we choose a theme via yahoo group mail, and I have had remarkeably few problems with anyone in years.

Oh yeah the DDI subscription, I paid for that too but come renewal time (if the damned CB and other tools are updated by then and I don’t cancel) I’ll probably be hitting them up for at least a few bucks a piece to keep it runnin’.

@ VLad – while it makes folks a little uncomfortable, just being honest and upfront makes a big difference.

“Hey guys, before we start, an order of business. I just picked up the X, as well as some Y. They were a bit expensive, so could I ask y’all to kick in a fiver to keep the pencils, notepaper, and books flowing?”

Since I am the most into D&D in my group I eat all of the gaming expenses. I don’t think the rest of the players would really want to invest that much, but they do enjoy coming out to play. This way I can get my D&D fix. I like to get miniatures for the big guys when I can (makes the players squirm when I pull out the mini for the Adult Blue Dragon 🙂 ) but for the most part I tend to use tokens, especially for the minions. I also have access to some printing services at work to print off battle maps which keeps the map costs down.

I guess what I am trying to say is, I don’t mind paying for the gaming stuff, or even putting in the time since I love D&D as much as I do.

Ha! I remember those passages in the 1st ed. AD&D stuff. We were pre-teens – early teens when that stuff came out, so like most suggestions from adults, we laughed and ignored it. Not that we ever saw any 3rd party AD&D stuff in stores where we lived anyway.

I usually cover the costs at the gaming table when I GM, though players are welcome to bring their own miniatures. I make it clear at the beginning that I reserve the right to refuse the use of any supplemental materials they buy which I do not own, however. During my brief stint running 4E, the group did chip in for me to buy a year’s worth of DDI. When I was requested to run World’s Largest Dungeon, back in the early days of 3.5, though, I got blank looks when I asked for money to help cover the cost of that book, even from the guy who really, really wanted me to run it. So, it’s hit and miss.

These days I’m willing to buy an extra copy of the core book of a new game I want to run, if it’ll get my players to give it a shot. I do encourage them to buy their own copy, though. I mean, I provide the house and run the games. Aside from bringing their own drinks and sometimes snacks, it’s the least they could do.

I’m blessed also. We all take turns with dinner duty, so that’s easy. I get Christmas gifts and they happily volunteer to contribute when I spend any kind of money. I’m building a projector/game table now, so they’ll all end up chipping in $20-$25 each. And when the projector bulb or projector dies, we’ll all chip in for a new one.
They’re great friends, which I think makes it easier. I buy most of my books, but I have had then purchased for me around birthdays/christmas.
They realize the amount of time and effort I put into DMing and really appreciate it. I think that is why they are all happy to contribute.

Years ago, an odd misunderstanding resulted in a small, blue, ceramic, pig-shaped piggy bank (with a cork for a nose) becoming known as the “Butt Goat”. The very next game, the Butt Goat had a sticker on it that read “Feed the Butt Goat”, and it has been used to buy communal munchies ever since. More recently, several members of the group and I have pooled money to buy boxes of loose minis off eBay for community use.

I get stuck with paying for books and our only DDI sub. but that’s the only stuff I take on alone. We each have our own mini collections that we pool to me, the DM, during game time. We all love dungeon tiles and like to get the coolest or most useful sets, but over time everyone just gave them all to me for convienience. We also buy each other D&D gifts for our birthdays or Christmas because we’re all best buds.

My players were willing to chip in to cover the cost of the DDI subscription as the whole group uses it with the updated character builder. They fronted the costs for their own minis and I usually just make tokens for the monsters.

We all purchase our own snacks before the game so that’s not a huge issue but any money we make off of the cans of pop or whatever we drink, goes towards future DDI subscription costs or the costs I usually take care of as the DM (paper for maps, washers for tokens, etc).

Our group currently rotates DM, so we all bear some of the costs. Our group has 2 couples, plus 3 pther players. In the group, we have 3 x PHB1, 2 x PHB2 & 3, 2 x DMG1 and 1 DMG2 + 2 DDI subscriptions. (these are just the ones I know of – there may be more). In addition, I (current DM) have just purchased battle map for my iPad, and am hoping to use a map on it on Friday 🙂

I have been DM’ing for 9 guys(6 are good friends) for the last 14 months. Before that one of them a close friend DM for 8 months. Between the two of us we split the cost of most everything. But we play 2ed. So our book purchasing is vary rare and usually off amazon. But between us we have probably 1600 minis we have purchased. 2 to 3 of every dungeon tile set out there. Battlemats & markers. You name it we split it. Thinking about this made me want to put a piggy bank out & have a small donation every Sunday from the guys.

When I run at the FLGS I have a tip box. It’s a nice old wooden box shaped like a chest that I dremelled a slot into the top of. There’s a note on the box that says something like “all monies in this chest shall be used for the betterment of the game for all players” and another sign that says “DM Tip Box”. It goes over great at the FLGS, but when I put it out on the table for the group I have been running with for years, I got stares that basically said “what are you trying to pull?”

Every now and then… and by that I mean every 8 years or so, one of the players will buy a module for me to run or a rulebook.

Now I have a newer group, made up of mostly players I met through the FLGS. These guys are a lot better about it as the tradition of me paying for everything isn’t already there. I haven’t tried putting out the tip box again (those stares from my regulars really were cold) but I do use a fun point system that rewards them in game for bringing snacks for everyone, for having their own minis, buying rulebooks etc. This group was also very willing to split a DDi subscription. Heck maybe I should toss that tip-box back out.

I love the WotC D&D Dungeon Tile sets, especially the Master series. Miniatures are cool, but my group is getting into the tokens. We play a lot of boardgames so they don’t bother us as much as most mini-only users. I can tell you that I prefer hauling around tokens, to games, than boxes of minis.

Food wise my players all contribute, either drinks or munchies. Last month was an exception as I wanted to give them a treat for Halloween so I bought lots of themed treats. I pay for gaming materials. My reasoning behind this is that if the group split up then you’d have to divide the materials people paid towards, such as minis. By paying for them myself it cuts out that problem. I could see why a DM might want to split a DDI sub between his players as that can be costly. The only item that sometimes irks me is printer ink. I don’t know how it is in other countries but here in the UK it’s about £30 for new ink (colour and black) and it doesn’t last terribly long. Over time it really adds up. The primary use of my printer is character sheets and power cards. I can just about get one set of cartridges to last 2 months.

For me; I print out my own tokens, and don’t have the time or inclination to put them on washers or cardboard, that cuts the expenses of minis. I have a small selection of “player” minis for my players to pick one that’s “in the ballpark”, but a couple of my players don’t feel it’s their character unless they get their own mini (usually 2 because they can never decide which they like most out of two figures). I mooch the DDI subscription off a pal, which seems fair enough as the cost of DDI is extorionate for “just a character builder” for one player who doesn’t have any interest in DMing, etc. I have a paizo basic flip-mat (hoping to get some more soon), and some dungeon tiles (I also want to expand my collection of these as a matter of priority) which is where my key expenditure has been.

I’m the only person to have books, and I have a fair few.

As for food, we all take it in turns with occasional “everyone gets their own take-out” breaks in between, although my turn up seems to come up pretty infrequently; my guys would rather have me building encounters than rattling pots and pans. Everyone gets their own beers, but people are pretty cool about sharing and pooling the booze, so I tend to get some top-ups on those too. It’s pretty convenient reciprocity.

It’s my hobby, I spend the time, effort and expense on minis because I want to make the game more enjoyable for me, therefore it’s my cost. That said, there is an unwritten rule at my table that it’s the players jobs to provide munchies for the evening. I’m sure the amount of coke and wine gums I’ve been fed over this campaign adds up to my upfront mini purchases 🙂

My players are awesome, every couple of months, I show up for a session, and there’s a box full of minis or tiles for me as a gift for my work as a DM. It’s nice, because we now have a chest full of minis and tiles, which I fully intend to gift to the next DM when I step down. The rest of the stuff, is simple, books and insider accounts are buy em if you want them, borrow them when you need them, and dinner is pot luck.

It sounds crazy, but it’s almost like, we’re doing a communal activity, so we work together as a group to provide the supplies, with everyone contributing as they can when they can.

I usually pay for the material by myself, but for some really expensive prints I ask for some contribution so the game can go on.
But I think I’ll ask them to help me out more, because I’m running out of money right now LOL

I have been gaming since I was a wee lad back in 1983. Back then it was the Peachy folder, blue graph paper, and pencil drawn marks to track the party on their adventure. Now, at 41, I am able to afford all those ooh-n-aah things that I’ve seen growing up. I have purchased a small army of miniatures (my 4 yr old approves wholeheartedly), Dwarven Forge, Miniature Building Authority (25mm), and other terrain props and styrofoam features. Do I charge? My wife affectionately refers to our gaming group as the 40 year old Virgin Dragon Slayers. With those kinds of images conjured the only thing I charge is to have a good time. We chip in for food when we meet for our monthly sessions. If there’s a birthday, we chip in extra and raze a town. Players have donated minis, books, props, and game aides. One rule that we stick to is DM doesn’t pay, and that role gets rotated often enough to spread the wealth.
It is important to do what works for your group. Always be straight forward and clear what and how expenses are shared. This way, everyon can focus on the important issues: who’s turn is next.
GAME ON!

I’ve been gaming with the same core group for several years now. We’ve managed to work out our cost issues. People tend to provide for themselves, that includes books, accessories and food. Munchies are usually brought by the players because the GM tends to lug around more stuff than everyone else. We don’t want to stress the GM.

For people without gear we usually share and we take care of someone else’s stuff. A lot of the players volunteer the use of their things. One leaves a bucket load of plastic minis and tokens at wherever we’re playing. The music buff brings a lot of his music. A couple of other guys offer to print things for other players.

For the supplements, the person most interested tends to buy it for himself or herself. I’ve had to implement some rules thanks to splatbook explosion:

1. Supplemental material needs pre-approval.
2.The player has to provide the GM with a copy of all supplemental rules used by his or her PC or at least attach said rules to the PC sheet.
3. If the GM can’t access the material, it does not exist.

There’s two of us who rotate DMing, and we effectively share costs. He is a big D&D Miniatures player, so he has tons of miniatures, and the miniatures maps. We each brought a battlemat to the party. We each have a DDI subscription. I buy more of the hardcovers, and everyone uses them.
The other guys in our group are comparatively young, and they just come and play. I don’t have a problem with that.
Food – people usually bring their own, but we also often share pizzas and drinks and whatnot.
To be honest, the question never really occurred to me before, in all my decades of gaming.